Thursday, January 28, 2016

10 Years Ago Today. A Flashback and Big Thirsty All At Once. Q: In Today's Academy Would Newbie Have Found Anything Changed?

Saturday, January 28, 2006A Newbie From Arizona.

I did my Ph.D. work in the Pacific Northwest and earned most of my fellowships through editing and publishing, so my work in the classroom was very light before I started my first year on the tenure-track.

I wore a nice charcoal pantsuit to my first class last September and sweated through the jacket before I even got to class. I took it off in the hallway in front of my classroom before going in - I was wearing a perfectly normal camisole top that is quite modest - and two young men walked past me, one of them saying, "Pass me the JUGS, man."

I was caught up by that, but also just the nerves of this first day of all first days. When I walked into the classroom and went to the front, the two young guys I saw outside were in the front row. One was sheepish - thanks to something I imagine his parents might have given him while growing up - but the other just fixed me with a big grin.

I felt like I was in some sort of bad TV movie called "Teacher's First Day," and all I wanted to do was crawl back into the comfort of grad school, of my safe apartment in Seattle, my coffee, my friends, my sweatpants, my bookbag, and a dream that I was entering into the life of the mind.

I made it through the semester. I'm still on the job. But that first semester wiped clean any idea I ever had that teaching in a college is anything but babysitting. My students complained if I asked them to write 500 words. They would lie to my face about any and everything. One girl told me that the college's computer lab (there are 4, 3 of them open 24 hours a day), closed unexpectedly at 6 pm and she couldn't print her paper in time. I asked her about the other labs on campus and she whined, "They're ALL the way on other side."

I fielded an endless array of stories about dead family members. I heard about car crashes on every highway in and around the city. Nobody could make it to class when it rained. The heat index was 120 and when they were in high school they didn't have to go to class. They knew I'd understand.

I sat in my new and clean office and felt like a failure most days.

I went for help from my mentor, a woman about 25 years my senior, and told her everything. She nodded her head, took it all in, and said, "They're kids, honey. They don't know any better."

She hoisted me up, boosted my confidence a bit and told me to get tough. I wear dress shirts to class. I don't take any shit. I have policies on my syllabus about being in class - regardless of temperature. I have deadlines and there are consequences if they're not met. The students started this semester in the same way, complaining, whining, but I'm a new woman.

I wear my iPod - see, I have one, too! - and don't let their innocence and ignorance bother me. I teach what I know. I help when they want it - and more and more do. And when they act like they need sitters, I refuse to be one.

But this is not the life I thought was coming.

3 comments:

I think that readjustment -- realizing that most of our students are not the geek/nerds that we were, and must be treated differently than we would want to be treated -- is still a significant factor, though more phd programs have teaching components so it might be a little less.

I see young faculty now coming in expecting to coddle kids. They were codded some, too. It's not as jarring to them as it was to my generation (late 40s) who had one experience as a student and a different one as a professor

One of my very first students, relegated to a class of one (the program was very damaged at that point), argued with me that s/he thought the work s/he turned in was good. I told hir that the fact that s/he liked it didn't mean it was good - and to do it over. I had to stand firm and s/he finally complied and put appropriate thought into it.

Another student, in a different class, slid hir chair back from hir desk and put hir feet up - blocking me from passing. Sat there grinning at me. I told hir... Put your feet on the floor and explained s/he could leave as s/he seemed hesitant to comply. S/he was a problem all semester.

Things improved somewhat over time as students learned that I hold students responsible for behaving with some level of civility. But problem students persist. Those who talk while I am talking (carrying on conversations with classmates as if I cannot hear them), students who resist all instruction then get belligerent about grades.

What Was This?

College Misery was a dysfunctional group blog where professors got the chance to release some of the frustration that built up while tending to student snowflakes, helicopter parents, money mad Deans, envious colleagues, and churlish chairpeople.

Our parent site, Rate Your Students, started in 2005, and we continued that mission beginning in 2010. Ben at Academic Water Torture and Kimmie at The Apoplectic Mizery Maker both ran support blogs during periods when this blog had died.